Serviio is a free media server. It allows you to stream your media files (music, video or images) to renderer devices (e.g. a TV set, Bluray player, games console or mobile phone) on your connected home network. There is also a paid for Pro edition($25) which further enhances the possibilities of sharing content in your connected household. Serviio works with many devices from your connected home (TV, Playstation 3, XBox 360, smart phones, tablets, etc.). It supports profiles for particular devices so that it can be tuned to maximise the device's potential and/or minimize lack of media format playback support (via transcoding). Free vs Pro comparison.
Full description.

added serviio.libraryPollerFrequency system property for controlling the timeout of POLLER frequency
added serviio.forceLibraryPoller system property for forcing the usage of POLLER library scanner; ticket #849
series can now be named with the IMDB ID as a search hint (as well as movies); ticket #839
optimized embedded burned-in subtitles delivery so that it doesn't time out; ticket #838
added support for series thumbnails with XBMC metadata source; ticket #764
added the possibility to use alternative Java (to the bundled one) on Windows; ticket #842
fixed OSX console not starting after upgrade from previous versions; ticket #840
fixed parsing relative paths in ASX playlists
optimised polling mechanism for shared folders on OSX / BSD, it now runs every 5 minutes by default as a POLLER; ticket #846
fixed some audio files being restarted after the buffering has finished in MediaBrowser
fixed burning in subtitles on Linux for file with apostrophy in the name; ticket #844
fixed MediaBrowser player sliding on small screens
updated bundled JRE to 1.8.0_31

Ive tried ALL the DNLA media servers out there, Serviio is just the best one!

Online plugins support is amazing, you can download custom video websites plugins like iPlayer, YouTube, HULU ect
Theres even apps on Android and Windows phone to remotely change settings
Best of you can stream outside your home using MediaBrowser and Android app called ServiiGo

I've been using Serviio for about a year now. Absolutely the easiest media server software to install, setup and use, and I've tried almost all of them. Not a lot of bells and whistles but it works great. I have all my media installed 1.5TB WDHD and use WD Live Plus unit with a wireless usb router to connect to my desktop PC, which is a dedicated to media only. Best of all, the program is free, and has great support!!!

Serviio in my opinion is the best available DLNA media server. I currently use it to stream to my xbox 360 and ps3 from my video library and also live streams. I choose it over PMS because of its ability to handle my mkv files and also the software developer is very active in the support forums and frequently replies to help requests and posts. It is 100% Free however it is something that I would pay for if need be.

Using version 0.6.2 and can now access online content in addition to local content. There is a learning curve to using it especially the online content function. Works great for me. I'm getting smooth HD video on a wifi connection.

For those having problems make sure you have the right Profile (under Status) selected for the IP address of your device. Click on the assigned profile to change it. Also there is a very active Serviio Forum and Wiki for help.

I was unable to get it to work correctly, i use ps3 media server... had to uninstall it to even get this program to open.. after that i could not get my media to show on my ps3.. even after i disable my firewall... folders poped up but no video... sorry... i was looking for something new... this was not it...

I've been using version o.5.2 for several months and it does the job. Occasionally I loose connection but I think it is a problem with my Samsung Bluray player. It plays all the mkv and avi files I've tried. Video runs smooth. I can pause, rewind and fast forward video. Rewind and fast forward could be smoother but it does work well enough to be useful.

It works better than the DLNA software that Samsung offers with it's player.

I am absolutely hooked! I have been trying many different servers for quite some time now and I believe I have finally found what I have been looking for.

Previously I have been using Java PS3 Media Server and over all was quite happy with it. I had a few problems with it crashing on me when trying to view some movie files and it would crash on those specific files every time, regardless of the format, while it would play others in the same format with no problems, so I always assumed it was just a "bad encode" of those files. I have a pretty puny computer being used as my media server with only 512MB of RAM (its Rhambus memory and its too expensive to add or replace) and PS3 Media Server used most of the resources while it was being used, especially while transcoding. Enough on that.

I installed Serviio, which was a pretty standard and simple process. I then pointed the "share" to my external 1 TB, NTFS formatted, drive that is my video collection. Next, I fired up the PS3 and it picked up the server by the time the PS3 booted up. I did have to wait quite some time for all my media to show up. The reason it took so long was Serviio (optionally) extracts the metadata for each file and goes to the Net to find information used to sort the media. It find directors, actors, and other useful info so that you can simply select "Angelina Jolie" and watch all the movies you have with her beautiful presence or hunt for all the bad@$% movies directed by Micheal Bay. It also gets the cover art, so that you scroll through images rather than simply text. Having the DVD/BluRay covers is a must for me. It makes it look like your media collection is on your TV naturally rather than some kind of cheap hack, which really impresses my less techy friends. PS3 Media Server would display previously downloaded covers, but who has time to search for all of those things.

Serviio is DLNA compliant which basically the same thing as uPNP. I'm not sure what else is required to go from the standard uPNP to DLNA cert, but the PS3's requirments of DLNA is satisfied.

So far it has played every format I have tried without hesitation and I didn't have to do anything other than select it on screen through the PS3, unlike PS3 Media Server where you would sometimes have to select "Transcode". So far I have run .MP4/M4V, .AVI (xvid), and a couple of .MKV's all which played flawlessly.

Now for the bad... which isn't much. It would be nice to have a little more options in the control console, although I can't really think off the top of my head what I would want, however there is very little tuning that can be done to the server, at least not through the console.

I have tried Nero Media Home, in which I quit using pretty quickly, in what I can only recall must have been a lack of format support (probably .mkv). Windows Media Player 11 worked great after I added the K-Lite codec pack, however I got tired of disabling sharing every time I wanted to rename, move, edit, or delete a file because Windows gives you the "file is in use" error. I did update to the PS3 Media Server for Windows v1.20.412 BETA at the same time i was installing Serviio and that seemed to fix the "Corrupt Data" problem i had gotten previously with some of my files.

I am very pleased at this piece of software and it has taken its place as my "main" media server. I intended to maintain both Nullriver's MediaLink and PS3 Media Server on my MacBook Pro for the ease of use while traveling, since i don't always have time to let it compile a media listing.

I almost didn't give this software a "10" because of lack of options, however after thinking about it, I don't feel I am missing anything as of yet. It works, it works great, and it is so easy my wife and son can use it! Wahoo, finally!

I've tried several servers that don't work with my Samsung C6500 or work poorly. Serviio works fine. Also it has a configuration file that allows user configurations to be added if changes are required to get it to work with other devices.

Looks like a nice little tool but like most other freeware tools it lacks in support.
I have been trying several different DLNA media servers and yet to find one that works with my Sony Bluray BDV-E770w.

Interface between Serviio and Java is broken. Serviio cannot find Java so program does not open on Win7-64bit OS. Sorry for the low score and hope the interface issue is fixed in next version so I can try what looks to be a promising program.

Posted September 16, 2010 by T_Bear.

Tool version 4.2
using OS Windows 7 64-bit

Ease of use 1
of 10

Functionality 1
of 10

Value for money 1
of 10

Overall score 1
of 10

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